A vain attempt to document my adventures as I construct a MAME arcade machine using only my bare hands and things that my hands can use

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Stage 8: The Pinball Wizards

In case you haven't already, I suggest a thorough perusal of Classic Playfields website, which details this really cool business that I had no idea existed in my own backyard. This is really an example of a couple of guys who are doing something that they really enjoy and turning a nice little profit while they're at it.

I first made contact with Kevin over email several weeks earlier, and after the clusterfuck with U-Haul I was happy to finally meet him and check out his operation first-hand.

Kevin and his pal Mike were just about to start print work on their Centaur Project, and they were happy to give myself and Cee a guided tour of their playfield workshop, located in the basement of Kevin's immense luxury home.

I could spend a full hour detailing the coolness of the work they're doing in there, so just visit their site and take my word for it that they are printing some awesome shit down there. The investment of gear and time they've put in is really incredible, and if there are any pinball fans out there, you should really contact these guys and see if you can visit them for yourself.

Having already been tantalized by some of the wicked pictures from their website, Kevin then treated us to a tour of his awe-inspiring game room upstairs. To say this was impressive would be the understatement of the year.

I found myself agog as I stood in 1,700 square feet of checkered floor and pinball machines. The tented ceilings and wicked lighting only helped me to appreciate someone who was really, really into their craft. These pictures really don't do it justice, you have to stand in this room to truly breathe this shit in. Fantastic.

Anyways, after fifteen minutes of wondering how brilliant it would be to play groundhockey or throw a massive party in this room, we moved back to the task at hand - pickup up the two cabs Kevin had for me.

The first was an old Tetris-clone that Kevin had courteously already slapped onto a dolly for us. Cee and I managed to negotiate it onto the U-haul with a minimum of difficulty.

But the second cab was considerably heavier and larger, an old WrestleFest 3-player JAMMA cabinet. Mike suggested I back the U-Haul up to the garage where this beast was being housed and after some amusing antics I managed to slowly weave our craptacular van backwards up to the garage without ruining Kevin's lawn or smashing into the other cars in the driveway.

The four of us managed to wrestle this cab into the truck with some concerted effort. The sheer weight of this thing was incredible, and I began to have concerns about how exactly myself and Cee were going to lug this thing in the front door of Allan Street by ourselves - concerns that, unbeknownst to me, Cee was harbouring as well.

Unswerved, we made our goodbyes and set forth rolling back to Halifax with our precious cargo in tow. The real test of our mettle - and the perilous brush with the breaking point in this project - was just around the corner.